Captain of all these men of death - tuberculosis remains the commonest diagnosis - two years experience of bronchoscopy at Shaikh Zayed hospital, Lahore

ABSTRACT

A retrospective study of two years duration was conducted at the department of Pulmonology, Shaikh Zayed Hospital, Lahore, Pakistan to review our experience with bronchoscopy. Data was collected from145 patients who underwent bronchoscopy for different diagnostic and therapeutic indications. The study participants were having ages between 13 and 93 years. There were 85 male and 60 female patients. Bronchoscopy was performed for diagnostic purposes in 124 [85%] patients, for therapeutic purposes in 9 [6%] patients and for surveillance of airways in 13 [9%] patients. Bronchoscopy remained diagnostic in 74.19% patients. Tuberculosis was the commonest diagnosis in 34.6% patients followed by malignancy which was diagnosed in 16.1% patients. In 82% patients there was no complication during procedure, while mild haemoptysis occurred in 11.72%, 5.5% had wheezing [bronchospasm], 4.1% developed low grade fever and 1 patient died due to respiratory failure. It was concluded that bronchoscopy is found to be a useful procedure and can be used safely for diagnoses and treatment of different respiratory diseases